DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5538#0024
4 PHARAOHS, FELLAHS, AXD EXPLORERS.
sites, and each explorer has some new thing to tell. What
Marietta began thirty years ago, Maspero carried on and
developed; and it was to Maspero's wise liberality that the
Egypt Exploration Fund was indebted, in 1883, for liberty
to pursue its work in the Delta. In that year the society
despatched its first agent—M. Naville—upon its first expedi-
tion ; and since 18S3 the French in Upper Egypt, the Eng-
lish in Lower Egypt, have labored simultaneously to bring
to light the buried wealth of the most ancient of nations.
Thus the work of discovery goes on apace. Old truths re-
ceive unexpected corroboration; old histories are judged by
the light of new readings; fresh wonders are disclosed wher-
ever the spade of the digger strikes new ground. The in-
terest never flags—the subject never palls upon us—the mine
is never exhausted.
I will go yet further, and say that this mine is practi-
cally inexhaustible. Consider, for instance, the incredible
number and riches of the tombs of ancient Egypt, and the
immense population of the Nile Valley in the times of the
Pharaohs. That immense population continued during a pe-
riod of between four and five thousand years to embalm and
secrete their dead, interring with them, according to the
customs of successive epochs, funerary statues, vases, weap-
ons, amulets, inscribed tablets, jewels, furniture, food, stuffs;
articles of apparel, such as sandals, combs, hair-pins, and even
wigs ; implements, and written documents on papyrus, leath-
er, and linen. Conceive, then, what must be the number of
those sepulchres, of those mummies, of those buried treasures!
The cemeteries of Thebes and Memphis and Abydos have en-
riched all the museums of Europe, and are not yet worked
out. The unopened mounds of Middle and Lower Eg_ypt,
and the unexplored valleys of the Libyan range, undoubt-
edly conceal tens of thousands of tombs which yet await the
scientific, or unscientific, plunderer.
The late Dr. Birch—a cautious man, and the last man in
the world to exaggerate—estimated the number of corpses
embalmed during two thousand seven hundred years at no
sites, and each explorer has some new thing to tell. What
Marietta began thirty years ago, Maspero carried on and
developed; and it was to Maspero's wise liberality that the
Egypt Exploration Fund was indebted, in 1883, for liberty
to pursue its work in the Delta. In that year the society
despatched its first agent—M. Naville—upon its first expedi-
tion ; and since 18S3 the French in Upper Egypt, the Eng-
lish in Lower Egypt, have labored simultaneously to bring
to light the buried wealth of the most ancient of nations.
Thus the work of discovery goes on apace. Old truths re-
ceive unexpected corroboration; old histories are judged by
the light of new readings; fresh wonders are disclosed wher-
ever the spade of the digger strikes new ground. The in-
terest never flags—the subject never palls upon us—the mine
is never exhausted.
I will go yet further, and say that this mine is practi-
cally inexhaustible. Consider, for instance, the incredible
number and riches of the tombs of ancient Egypt, and the
immense population of the Nile Valley in the times of the
Pharaohs. That immense population continued during a pe-
riod of between four and five thousand years to embalm and
secrete their dead, interring with them, according to the
customs of successive epochs, funerary statues, vases, weap-
ons, amulets, inscribed tablets, jewels, furniture, food, stuffs;
articles of apparel, such as sandals, combs, hair-pins, and even
wigs ; implements, and written documents on papyrus, leath-
er, and linen. Conceive, then, what must be the number of
those sepulchres, of those mummies, of those buried treasures!
The cemeteries of Thebes and Memphis and Abydos have en-
riched all the museums of Europe, and are not yet worked
out. The unopened mounds of Middle and Lower Eg_ypt,
and the unexplored valleys of the Libyan range, undoubt-
edly conceal tens of thousands of tombs which yet await the
scientific, or unscientific, plunderer.
The late Dr. Birch—a cautious man, and the last man in
the world to exaggerate—estimated the number of corpses
embalmed during two thousand seven hundred years at no